Coles Dark Cooking Chocolate. And Teletubbies.

We all do silly things sometimes, and later wish we hadn’t. For example, I bet Malcolm Turnbull and K.Rudd wish they’d played their cards differently this past year. If they had, it might have been their turn to face the Federal Election next month, and not their respective usurpers (so to speak). I also assume that one day Heidi Montag is going to regret making the decision to stop looking like a human, and I wouldn’t be surprised if the creators of Teletubbies sometimes wonder what went wrong in their cognitive faculties the day they thought those terrifying creatures up.

Actually, scratch the last one. I’m fairly certain the Teletubbies’ creators were on crack, which means they can’t be held accountable for their actions. (“Tinky-Winky! Dipsy! Laa-Laaaaaaaaa! Po!” Think about it. What other reason could there be?)

Anyway, before I start looking for a television in my own tummy, let’s talk about my current Wish-I-Hadn’t.

Coles Dark Cooking Chocolate

I bet the woman would look more animated if she were serving that cake to Tinky-Winky.

Here are my excuses for eating this… product:

1a) I needed chocolate and this was the only type in the house.

1b) Lie. I had plenty of other chocolates in my stash.

2a) I want my blog to be about broad-spectrum snacking chocolate, not just artisan and/or speciality and/or expensive chocolate.

2b) Semi-truth. I do want my blog to blur the Bourdieu-esque high/low culture divide, but “cooking” chocolate isn’t really something people buy as a treat. Therefore 2a is a moot point.

3a) I couldn’t help myself.

3b) Truth. How could I resist something with a cookie-cutter housewife image on its packaging and “Nature Identical Flavour” as an ingredient? I want to look as apathetic about baked goods as that woman, and I want to know what Nature tastes like. Don’t you?

Mmm, grey foodstuffs.

The colour scheme of the chocolate in that photo is not a mistake. I didn’t have my camera set to black and white or fluorescent or what-have-you. And by “colour scheme” I clearly mean “unceasingly grey”, which in turn means I must give Coles points for one thing: I’ve never eaten grey chocolate before.

I’ve also never eaten chocolate with such a horrific melt. In fact, there was no melt. This chocolate’s texture was the black hole, the absence, of meltingness. Let us call this an UnMelt. It was almost impossible to bite into and, after managing that not-small feat, chewing it was like chomping on the nine-months-later-consequence of a one-night stand between chalk, styrofoam, and sawdust. (And before you ask, no, I’m not sure who the father is. One of those is going to get off scot-free when the paternity results come in.)

Does it look better from this angle? No. No, it does not.

Want to know the really odd thing? (Apart from the fact that the UnMelt made this chocolate seem a different species to, say, Valrhona chocolate, and that I managed to finish the whole 200g in three days anyway.)

Coles Dark Cooking Chocolate actually had some distinguishable flavour notes. Most noticeably, it tasted like chocolate drinking powder. The kind that makes not-great hot chocolate when mixed with hot milk, and almost-as-awful-as-Teletubbies hot chocolate when mixed with hot water. Doesn’t exactly get you excited inside, does it?

There were even some brown sugar and golden syrup notes mixed in with the inoffensive cocoa powder and sugar flavours, but I can’t lie to you: I still wish I’d saved my chocolate-snacking minutes for something infinitely more worthy.

Question Time: Have you said or done something recently that you kinda wish you hadn’t?

Oh Hannah. Hannah. What were you thinking? Cooking chocolate isn’t edible, even when it’s a name brand not a home brand.I suspect you knew that, but I do realise that anything can happen late at night. I admire your honesty in blogging it. I must say that it isn’t going to make me pine like the Vestri post did (and still does). Even the woman on the wrapper looks embarrassed, or bemused at the very least at flogging the stuff. Oh and in the Sunday paper today I noticed a reference to the…….wait for it……Smurf Movie that is to be released next year!

Oh I have so many sub-standard chocolate regrets. Why did I waste my time, money, and possibly health for such unenjoyable products!!? Seriously, if I get diabetes from some of the bullshit I’ve eaten, I’m gonna be PISSED.
(don’t really mind if it happens as a result of genuinely good items… that’s fair game)

Today’s Sort-Of-But-Not-Really regret follows visiting Heidi/TCC at the markets. Upon seeing a few of the macaron flavours with only two left, I decided it’d be cruel to just leave one of each all on its ownsome. It’d be so lovely without its fellow-flavoured brothers and sisters!!
So I asked for the remaining two of each of those flavours. But then I wanted to try some of the others… and I didn’t want to seem like I cared less about them by buying fewer – besides, what if they ended up being better?! and I’d only bought ONE!!? – so I got two of each of all the remaining flavours as well.

End result? A lot of macarons. I would love to say that I’ll pace myself and daintily nibble on them over the coming days.. But honestly? I’m pretty sure they’ll all be demolished for dessert tonight.

I applaud your selfless pursuit of chocolate egalitarianism. All chocolates are create equal! Forget about Anthony Bourdain being all macho about eating balut – Coles Dark Cooking Chocolate is gritty hard-core eating at its finest. lol. Seriously, I am in awe! Now we know why the woman on the front of the packet is looking so tense!

Funny thing about Teletubbies — a long, long time ago, before Teletubbies had reached the U.S. market, my dad went on a business trip to London. He brought back this ridiculous yellow toy for my sister. We thought: Absurd! Those silly Brits! The toy was a joke we shared with every disbelieving visitor to our home. Then to our astonishment, a year or two later, Teletubbies saturated the U.S. market. I couldn’t believe Americans would embrace such a thing.

Annd oh boy, good day to ask me about regrets. Nothing but a bubble tea and a zucchini muffin today, so I was STARVING on my way home tonight and picked up some sesame chicken and assorted Indian-ish food at a Wegmans buffet. Predictably, 30 minutes later: Blehh.

Fiona: Wow. There’s something I never would have expected to hear you say! You’re a woman of complexity, clearly.

Agnes: I think you’re right. I notice, though, that you refrained from offering *your* mobile number to me in my hours of need…

Louise: I only have one potential rebuttal to what you say, and that’s that I don’t think cooking chocolate *should* necessarily be awful! Surely if we’re supposed to eat it in baked form, it should taste okay normally too?! Also – yes, I’m interested in the Smurf movie 🙂 Not because I’ve ever like the Smurfs (don’t think I’ve even seen an episode) but it’s got Neil Patrick Harris in it, whom I’ve been in love with ever since Dr Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog.

Kath: And it was just as grey when you had it? What a terrible Offical Masterchef Supermarket.

L-Izzle: I’m often at my crankiest when I’ve wasted a meal’s worth of tummy space on a bad dish. I think that’s a contributing factor to my ambivalence about eating out – I *hate* wasting eating opportunities on something that doesn’t make me gleeful 😉 Also, that was such a lie of a regret: “oh, poor me, I have more macarons than everyone else around me, woe woe woe”. Hmph.

Camille: Was that when you facebooked about playing Mariokart? How could that have been a bad thing? 😀

Penny: Impatience can be a curse sometimes, can’t it? Like when it makes us burn our tongues trying to eat something yummy when it’s too hot… 😛

Lorraine: Positive thinking, I like it! So the good thing is I now know to avoid grey UnMelting chocolate 🙂

Helen: Teehee, I feel quite stupendous after your comment, like I just saved a puppy from a burning building or something 😀 Maybe I’m a Chocolate Superhero of some sort?

Lisa: You’ve got the right idea, my dear! Horrific stuff!

Lauren: Teehee. I can’t believe you actually thought you as Americans were superior to another culture in terms of pop culture 😉 Come on, lady…. you brought the world Jersey Shore. (And yes, I do remember that you watch that :D) Is the Wegman’s buffet really that bad? Should’ve stuck with the chocolate aisle…

Vaala: I definitely still have a nostalgic spot in my heart for my primary school days spent stealing Nestle chocolate “bits/drops”, meant for cooking, for an afternoon snack. But they didn’t try to break my teeth, like this did. And ooh, now you *have* to tell about last night!

LOL. We had terrible chocolate when I was growing up, cooking chocolate was the height of awesome. I guess you don’t know much better when the choice isn’t out there. Now I wouldn’t go near the stuff. No point making something with chocolate if it’s only going to taste un-chocolatey and awful at the end. Good on you for trying though, even if it was a grey product.

I’m always doing or saying things and then regretting them. I’ve learned to talk and move very, veeeerrrry slowly, one frame at a time, so I’ve got time to think about unintended consequences.

HungryandFrozen: Sometimes ignorance isn’t bliss, then, in the case of chocolate? 😛 My main problem is overanalysing conversations I’ve had with people after I’ve had them, and suddenly deciding that *something* I said is clearly going to make them want to throw hellfire and brimstone at me. I’ve been working towards accepting that this is, nine times out of ten, probably not true.

Have they really quoted that wishy washy looking housewife as saying “I love to serve up delicious chocolate desserts”?? And why does the cake she’s holding look very unchocolatey? It’s all a bit suss..